Talk:Section 116 of the Constitution of Australia

"preamble to the Constitution"
Yes, today in the High Court will be interesting! However, there is a point where you seem to have preferred economy of expression to exactness. "Almighty God" is not in a preamble to the Constitution itself, which does not have a preamble. It is in the preamble to the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 (Imp), which contains the Constitution. To clarify this in the main text could produce cumbersome wording. Maybe add to footnote 12: "More exactly, in the preamble to the Commonwealth of Australia Constitution Act 1900 (Imp), which contains the Constitution." --Wikiain (talk) 03:14, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Thanks very much for picking that up -- I'm sure you're right I just don't have a source in front of me. No objections to anyone changing it though! --Mkativerata (talk) 07:20, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
 * Done - thanks. I'm going by what was done, which was to put AG there. I'll look up the debates, to check what was resolved by the framers. --Wikiain (talk) 22:06, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
 * I've looked and this was correct. McLeish just refers to "the preamble", which is ok since there is no other.  But Glynn refers precisely to "the preamble of an Act of Parliament" (2 March 1898).  He also speaks of the whole Act as the "Constitution", but obviously just for convenience. The distinction matters today, as you will know, because Constitution s 128, which provides for altering "the Constitution", appears not to be applicable to the material in the Act that precedes "the Constitution" itself - though that might be otherwise now, or at least since the Australia Act. --Wikiain (talk) 22:45, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

WilIiams v Commonwealth (2011)
I've completed the ref to the transcripts of argument in this case, so no more about it should be needed until the day of judgment. Stephen McLeish appeared in it as a recently appointed Solicitor-General for Victoria. --Wikiain (talk) 04:00, 12 August 2011 (UTC)

The HC dismissed the challenge relating to this section of the constitution, stating that the chaplains were not contracted by the Commonwealth. The article should be changed though to reflect that the religious test section has come before the HC.137.111.13.167 (talk) 01:20, 20 June 2012 (UTC)

Scientology
The statement that a law has never been overturned based on S116 is somewhat misleading. The High Court has overturned a Victorian law prohibiting Scientology that should have been dealt with under S116. It chose to ignore the fact that S116 prevents the High Court itself from interfering in the states right to establish/prohibit religion. Instead it relied on common lw to assert that it could hear the appeal by Scientologists that they were a religion for tax purposes. The High Court made a ruling which has now defined the meaning of religion in Australian, in contravention of S116. S116 withdraws any common law right of the Commonwealth (inluding the High court) to make a religious law. Thus Scientology can be banned by any state, Christianity can be established as a State religion, and Islam can be outlawed as an organisation that has declared itself as an enemy of the state by any state that sees fit to do so.

I'm not saying this is right. Its not. I'm say that its very very wrong, simply because S116 does not bind the states. The fact that 2 referendums on this subject failed to have S116 bind the states is no indication either of the will of the people. Those failures were due to the failure to articulate the nature of this difficult problem to the people.

Consequently, something needs to be added regarding the Church of Scientology. I'm a politician not a lawyer - so I'll leave this for discussion for now. Alexander Bunyip (talk) 11:30, 16 October 2016 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20120207163730/http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rp/1999-2000/2000rp02.htm to http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rp/1999-2000/2000rp02.htm

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 * archive is fine Find bruce (talk) 21:10, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

External links modified
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I have just modified one external link on Section 116 of the Constitution of Australia. Please take a moment to review my edit. If you have any questions, or need the bot to ignore the links, or the page altogether, please visit this simple FaQ for additional information. I made the following changes:
 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20101011032753/http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/comlaw.nsf/0/19541afd497bc2e4ca256f990081e2cf/$FILE/Constitution.pdf to http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/comlaw.nsf/0/19541afd497bc2e4ca256f990081e2cf/$FILE/Constitution.pdf

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 * I have replaced the dead link with a link to the specific section of the constitution on AustLII Find bruce (talk) 10:44, 7 October 2017 (UTC)